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A Priendly Controversy, 



BETWEEN 

REV. ]VER 



A BAPTIST MINISTER, 

J. B. ^NG^ELL, 

THE AUTHOR OF 

WHY I AM A SPIRITUALIST, 

ANI> 

WHY 1 AM NOT AN ORTHODOX, 



FRIENDLY CONTROVERSY 



BETWEEN 



REV. MR 



A BAPTIST MINISTER, 



AND 



J. B. ANGELL 



THE AUTHOR OF 



Why I am a Sjoiritualist, and Why I am not an OriJiodox^ 




Truth is Divine, whether outside the Bible or in ? Is error 
Divine because inside the Bible ? Ntvtr I 



KED BANK, N. J.|±f 1 ^-^V^ ^- 

1875. <" mjiAJl9 






Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the yoar 1874, by 

J. B. Angell, 
in the Office of the Librarian of Congress a* Washington. 



Mr. J. B, Angell : 

My Dear Friend: — Mr. B informs me that you 

will not be at his house to-day . This may be as well, so far 
as any conversation about our future destiny is concerned, 
though I should be glad to meet you. It will not avail any- 
thing for us to hold a contest of reason about spirituahsm, 
for you deny the premises of all my reasoning, viz. — the 
Bible. I have no other basis for my views of salvation 
through Jesus Christ, and you cannot be led to see the error 
of your system, except from the same source. "We must have 
an authoritative standard of truth and doctrine as a guide 
or we can never agree or settle anything. 

But all erroneous systems of belief that men sieze upon 
to give them hope for the future life, first deny in part 
or in toto the Bible as the revealed word of God, and then 
of course it is all plain sailing for them. Since the world 
began these systems of error and unbelief have existed, but 
they all begin just where the serpent began with the woman, 
by denying the word of God; and tben they draw out their 
systems as best suits their wickedness or the fancy of the hu- 
man mind. 

Sweedenborg devised a cunning system, partly formed on 
the Bible and partly of human reason, not to say satanic 
device. And the same is true of this subtle and bewitching 
system of error into which you have fallen, and to which 
you have given a soul too noble for such employment. 
These systems all have their rise and fall, their changes and 
new revelations, but the Word of God abides through 
the ages, the blessing of all who receive its truth. 

In that Word I find a divine Saviour, not a medium, but 
an Almighty, all-loving Saviour, who comes to me and 
puts a new life into my soul, and then leads me by the 
hand into pure and holy ways, leads me towards the heaven 
he has prepared for me and for all who will follow him. 



how much better to be led by the Son of God than by 
rapping and often lying spirits, even if Spiritualism were 
true! Now my dear friend, I want you to know this Saviour, 
by personal communion with him, through prayer, (for being 
divine he is to be worshiped,) I want you to know his love, 
his sweet, comforting, soul-satisfying love. No man can 
know true peace and true life that does not find it in Jesus 
Christ. 

i know something of these ways outside of Christ; know 
something of the maDy theories that men have devised to 
satisfy their souls; and I know they do not satisfy the wants 
of the human soul. I can roll up an amount of testimony 
on this point that ought to convince any one. Sweeden- 
borgenism. Spiritualism, Rationalism^ Free loveism, Unitari- 
anism, Universalism, Hindooism, (they are too numerous to 
name half of them) not one of them all satisfies the soul. 

We are charmed by them, but they don't satisfy the deep 
longings of the soul, they don't answer to die by, 

0, my friend, you have fallen into the snare of satan, who 
is binding your soul unto eternal death. You are trusting 
in a subtle theory that will vanish in the eternal world like 
vapour and leave you without any resting place for your 
soul. As sure as Saul of old was led to self-destruc- 
tion by this same destructive doctrine, so are you 
hastening to your own destruction in this behef 
cf the communication of Spirits. Our good Hea- 
venly Father never intended that we should receive 
our instruction and guidance in the great matters of the 
future life or of this life, through any such means. He sent 
his Son to us, not spirits. "What strange credulity that men 
will believe a word or letter of one whom they know to be 
immoral and wicked, who will accept their pretended 
communications and still reject the word of God through 
his Son. This is condemation! 

1 can't tell why but there has seemed to be a strange 
sympathy of feeling between us from the first. And without 



flattery I am free to say that I recognize a nobleness 
of nature in you that has drawn me towards you. And 
I have had a strange longing to help you out of the 
snare of the fowler which I am sure is holding you 
to everlasting ruin (except you escape). that I could 
help you, and that you would see the danger you are 
in ! How ardently I pray for you, and will pray that you 
may see the danger you are in. "What would I not do to 
help you to see the truth and to find the way of life which 
God has cast up for the redeemed to walk in! Do you real- 
ize the fearful end of a fatal mistake in this matter! A soul 
lost, there is no loss like this! I beg you to seek guidance 
from God in most earnest prayer! Do not trust this theory 
or system which rests on nothing but the fancy or senti- 
ment of man (unless it have a worse author). Man can 
make himself believe what he wants to believe and find 
proof of the same, but the truth as God has given it to us 
will alone save the soul. If you will be counseled by me 
I entreat you to seek God and not to seek after spirits 
who at best are but creatures, and all need the guidance 
and support of their Creator. 

Make your application to the Son of God and ask of him 
guidance and wisdom, forgiveness of sins and eternal life. 

That you may do so, and leave off* seeking after the spirits'^ 

is my most earnest prayer for you, and is your only hope. 

I am as certain that you will be lost in the way you are in 

as 1 am that God saves only through his Son Jesus Christ. 

Yours in highest regard, 



Phalanx, January 16th^ 1874. 

My Dear Friend : — Yours without date, came when 
I was absent to the city. Mrs. Holms, who took care 
of my house while I was gone, forgot to call my attention 



6 

to it, but in time I discovered it lying upon my centre 
table. I read it with great interest. I saw in it an 
earnest honestj^ of purpose, f ally confirming my previous 
impressions of the untiring sincerity of its author, and I 
do not think it would be safe for any one to say that its 
author has a greater respect for me, than the respect I en- 
tertain towards him in return. 

You state it will not avail anything for us to hold a con- 
test of reason about Spiritualism, because of its base differ- 
ing from yours. Now is it safe for any man to drive down 
his stake and say he is perfect in any important direction 
and more especially so in his religious views ? For does 
not history tell us that we have been progressing from 
way down the ages when they worshiped mere stolks and 
stones up to our present highest ideas of a living God, and 
that our intelligent judgment plainly tells us we are, as it 
were, infinitely more below perfection than the stolk and 
stone worshipers were below us ? Under these consider- 
ations it seems to me an exhibtion of undue presumption 
for a man to say, it is useless for two friends to meet to- 
gether to test the comparative evidences of our different 
positions ; for him, as it were, to say, I know mine to be 
true, and yours to be a mere shadow. It was but a few 
years ago, doubtless, your particular religion was considered 
a mere shadow, or something worse, for they considered 
its position so demoralizing that they burned old John 
Eogers at the stake for daring to preach his so-called here- 
sy, and now if one attempts to adopt the same privi- 
lege of entertaining further new ideas, more in accordance 
in my estimation with justice, mercy, and sound judgment, 
to be sure you do not burn him at the stake, but you tell 
him in substance, that if he perseveres in his course, that 
eternal death is his sure destiny, compared with which in 
my estimation, the burning at the stake would be im- 
measurably preferable. 

Of course your knowledge of spiritualism is very Urn- 



ited, and doubtless much that you have learned respecting 
it, has come through minds predjudiced against it, who 
have siezed only upon the evil reports respecting it, without 
investigating its great and glorious truths. 

If you recollect the Sunday I attended your church, Mr. 
DeWitt described a mother who had lost an only child, and 
when it was being deposited in the grave, the effect upon 
her was heart-rending in the extreme. Do you suppose 
her agony would have been so intense if she had been a 
spiritualist 1 Suppose she had received such vivid evidence 
as Mrs. Angell had experienced, (the description of which 
you must have read in my pamphlet). And further, I will 
describe to you another experience. Hearing through the 
papers of Mr. Mumler's spirit photography in New York, 
Mrs. Angell and myself decided to call upon him the 
earliest opportunity and see what we could for ourselves. 
We did so, but Mr. Mumler was not in; his wife was there 
and showed us an album containing quite a number of 
spirit pictures in connection with the principle ones. One, 
I recollect was the picture of a gentleman, (a Banker in 
Wall St.,) sitting in a chair, and near him stood a lady 
back of his left side with her arm partly around his neck, 
over his right shoulder, coming down over his breast with 
a bunch of flowers in her hand. This Mrs. Mumler told 
us was recognized at once by the gentleman as his wife, 
who had Ijft the form some years before, and he took it 
among her former aquaintances; and they all recognized it. 
(These spirit pictures are not as plain as the principle 
one, but plain enough to be unmistakably recognized.) 
Another that I saw was a lady's, who had lost an only 
child, aparently some ten or twelve years old. The lady 
was impressed at times that the spirit of her child was 
with her. She was well convinced ; she could feel its in- 
fluence. Hearing of Mumler's spirit photography she decided 
to go and see what she could attain, much against the ad- 
vice of her husband, for they were both prominent members 



8 

of tliQ Episcopal Church ; considering such tamperings al- 
most sacriligious, nothing but the vivid impressions of the 
mother would have prevailed upon her to attempt the experi- 
ment. She took her seat in the chair for the picture, hoping 
that if her child's picture was presented, it would appear 
with her mother's arms around her, with the child's face 
leaning upon her mother's breast as they often used to while 
at prayer. The picture was taken, and sure enough there the 
child was, just as she desired it ; the whole size and form, 
and make up, corresponding with the child while living. 
Can language describe the joyful contemplation of a loving 
mother whose very heart strings, as it were, (from parting 
from her only child a short time before,) had been torn 
from their deepest centre. And row to realize such vivid, 
and unmistakable evidence that her child was still with her ! 
This induced her husband to take a sitting, and his desire 
was to have the child, if it was presented, to be leaning 
upon his arm, a favorite position of theirs while the child 
was living in the body. He placed his arm in a position for 
such a result without letting the photographist know why 
he sat in that form, for the photographist criticised his 
position, saying it would not look well for a picture. The 
picture was taken, and there was the little daughter just in 
the position he wished it, looking up into his countenance 
with an expression of the most winning sweetness. He 
gave a look at it and burst forth with exclamations of holy 
joy, closing with, now Iknoto my child lives/ 

The skeptic will naturally say, this was a statement 
from a stranger, and an interested party. Now I will tell 
you what a turn it took. Soon after we were there, Mr. 
Mumler was taken up by the Mayor of New York, for 
swindling the people. Of course, in time, the trial came 
off. Nearly all the parties to the pictures which we saw 
there, and Mrs. Mumler described to us, were brought for- 
ward as evidence to prove the genuineness of his pictures, 
and this evidence was reported entire, in all the leading pa- 



9 

pers of the city, and the sworn evidence as far as the pic- 
tures she described to us went, agreed with her statement, 
word for word, as near as we coukl recollect, throughout; 
and although the Judge, the Ma)^or, and a'l the parties 
that opposed him, were bitter enemies, apparently, to 
Spiritual sm ; the evidence was so positive in favor of the 
genuineness of his Spiritual Pictures, that they dared not do 
any other than clear him. That was some three years 
ago, since which, he has been taking pictures right along 
in Boston 

If this woman that Mr.DeWitt described, had been a Spirit- 
ualist, she would already have been impressed with a posi- 
tive knowledge of the glorious existence of her child in spirit 
and further, this Spiritualism would tell her that was event- 
ually the destination of all, whether outside of the Church, 
or in. I did not understand Mr. DeWitt to state, whether 
this woman's child belonged to the church or not. But 
suppose he should meet a similar case, where the child 
was outside of the Church. Do you suppose he could, as 
it were, pour live coals upon her bleeding wound, by tell- 
ing her that her child was not only lost to her forever, but 
that it was doomed to misery throughout eternity, nay^ 
nay^ never ! ^ 

A man apparently of such a nobleness of soul, with 
marks of such an undeviating eye to justice, with a sym- 
pathy for his kind, that apparently was gushing out at 
every pore ; could never take his creed in his hand and 
read out the child's doom, to a mother in that condi- 
tion 1 How much rather would he say, get thee behind 
me the satanic part of my creed, and adopting the Spir- 
itualistic idea of pouring the healing ointment into her 
bleeding wound, saying, my dear woman, take comfort, 
for I positively know, that your child rot only lives in 
glory, but that in time, when 3 our scenes closes with 
your present form, you will meet her in the midst of 
that glory, with the fuU appreciation of a mother's love 



10 

towards her child. Does this look like the wiles of the ser- 
pent over the woman? Does this look as if I was led by 
the evil one? Would you not rather say that tbe eternal 
condemnation part of the Orthodox Creed was more in 
consonance with the character of the evil one? And can 
it appear strange to you that the present living evidence 
that I have had presented to me, should seem more relia- 
ble to me, than that, that was recorded some two to five 
thousand years ago. At times, too when bigotry was so in- 
tense, and the prejudices were so fierce, they would hang a 
Quaker, burn a Baptist, or nail a Christian to the cross, 
for daring to promulgate their so-called heresies to the peo- 
ple? And will you condemn me to eternal death, when 
perhaps I could no more believe your doctrine, than you 
could believe the necessity of the Hindoo Widow sacrificing 
herself upon the funeral pile of her husband? Or that the 
mother throwing her only begotten into the Ganges, that 
it might be saved in glory ? 

Suppose a Chinese Budhist should tell you, to prove the 
truth of his position, that his doctrine had stood the test 
of ages. That they had piled up such mountains 
of witnessess that it seemed as if it ought to con- 
vince any one. You see at once, the advantage he has over 
you in this kind of evidence as a proof of the truth of, his 
doctrine, for it has stood the ages of more thousands*of 
years than your particular denomination has hundreds, and 
they have and now are counting up witnesses by the hun- 
dred millions, where jours does by the single millions. 
Would such evidence as that have a feather's weight to- 
wards convincing you of their truth 1 Never. You would 
say truly, that it only proved the low mental and moral 
condition or status of their average mind. 

And is your position free from the appropriateness of a 
similar application ? What can be said of a class who pro- 
fessed to be followers of Christ, the spirit of whose life 
was to love their enemies, return good for evil, if a man 



11 

smite you on one cheek, turn the other also, and immedi- 
ately following tell us, as I have heard your ministers state, 
that God; through his wrath, hurls hh children into eter- 
nal misery for their stubornness against his plan of salva- 
tion? Is that returning good for evil? Does that possess the 
precious jewel, consistency ? And does not this make 
your God possess a quality you would most unhesitating- 
ly condemn in man ! 

You most earnestly tell me that if I want to enjoy sweet, 
soul-satisfying peace of mind to be prevailed upon to take 
your advice, and come into your line of salvation. Could 
it be possible that I should enjoy a self-satisfied state of 
mind, believing that four-fifths of my nearest and dearest 
connections and friends that had left the body, were al- 
ready f >regoing their doom of undescribable misery in the 
bottomless pit, and this doom was pronounced upon them, 
not because they were not the very patterns, perhaps, 
of justice, mercy and truth, not only Sundays, but every 
day, but because they failed to subscribe to your 39, more 
or less, articles of faith, a faith that had p'anks in it that 
they could no more believe in than you could believe in 
Oatholicism, Jesuitism, or Mahomedanisn. 

My Dear Mr. is that justice ? If I was so consti- 
tuted as to have so little sympathy for my kind, that I could 
with truth say I enjoyed a sweet peace of mind under such 
circumstances, would not I be a subject for pity ? And, 
furthermore, would not I especially be a subject for pity, 
if my mental organization was such, that some of the main 
features of my doctrine must be composed of wrath, ven- 
geance, and retaliation, or it would not seem a truth to 
me ? Would not the state of my mind be in a melancholy 
condition ? It appears to me it would be my most earncGt 
prayer, that not only myself but that all of my brethren 
might be prevailed upon to come up higher I 

Is it not plain, as intelligence advances, these things 
become better understood ? It appears to me you havQ to 



12 



exert yourselves more and more every year, to tax your in- 
genuity more, to take advantage of conditions so as to keep 
up the standand of interest. For instance, as an illustration, 
to try to prevail upon the young, and plead for parents to 
bring their children even. For while the clay is young and 
supple, it is more easily moulded according to the design of 
the potter. And if you can hold it in shape long enough 
to get upon it a good church bake, doubtless you feel it then 
quite secure, for it is not easy to alter a form of clay into 
a new and perhaps more desirable shape, after it has been 
well set. There is much clay, very much that is so gross that 
if you can knead it over, and bake it into your form, and 
make it equal to your standard, you have gained a great 
point. Herein, perhaps, is your work. But there is much 
clay that is in a condition for a higher religious standard, 
a higher round on the ladder, and adapted for living orna- 
ments upon that round, but you level all to the same form, 
and if one has a desire to take another step up the ladder 
you will, if you can, pull him b >ck. Here is your mistake. 
You make them all as it were, for illustration, into Ortho- 
dox jugs, which are well enough, and useful, if you would 
fill them with pure and wholesome material such as flows 
from the fount of Christ. But no, you mix with it wrath, 
vengeance, and, in my estimation, you can no more take 
this kind of mixture into your moral stomach, without its 
having its demoralizing effect, than you can take poisonous 
alchohol into your physical stomach, without its having its 
evil influence. The toper may flatter himself that he has 
quieted its desperate alcoholic influence by covering it over 
with honey and sugar, ft o that it will be very pleasant and 
apparently harmless to the palate, but as it is 1 mded upon 
the laboratory of the stomach, the poison is taken up by 
the valves, and is sent hissing through the veins over the 
whole sj^stem, and the consequences are, if persevered in, 
inflamed blood, blotched and swollen face and limbs, deli- 
rium, insanity, and a premature grave. And it is much so 



13 

with the angry passions of our creeds. You may so cover it 
with the true Christ principles that they will seem very 
pleasant to the moral palate, but when they land upon the 
laboratory of the moral stomach, the poison is sent hissing 
through the moral and mental veins, and it strikes out in ir- 
ritability, family bickerings, neighborly quarrels, national 
wars, and even in extreme cases, murder. For how tame is 
the anger of man up to the murder point, 
compared with that of a God, who through his 
anger, hurls his children throughout the world by 
thousands every hour into eternal misery, each moment 
of which is immeasureaby more severe, than the moment- 
ary suffering of the murdered man, while his life is being 
taken ! Is it strange that the daily papers are teeming with 
accounts of deadly conflict, when a great proportion of 
our very religion nurses in its bosom the seeds of such des- 
perate passionate qualities? But you see I am in the main 
trying to convince you of your position by the exercise of 
reason upon the subject. 1 believe the Orthodox generally 

try to prevail upon their people not to r ason. Mr. C ~ 

your predecessor, told us in a sermon he preached in our 
schoolhouse, that we must not reason upon their plan of sal- 
vation ; mind ^ou, be did not hesitate to reason most 
sharply upon thcshort comings < f other plans (is not here 
another'jewel missing), suppose you conclude to swallow 
blind the whole of your doctrine, the good, bad, and 
indifferent, does that hoodwink nature's laws ? Suppose 
you should undertake to plead for the reformation of a 
toper, telling him that if he persevered in his indulgences 
he wou'd land in ruin. 0, says he, I see you are exercising 
your reason, you must not reason upon tbe subject. Do 
you suppose that would stay the demoralizing effect of the 
alcoholic poison ? Does not the very fact of your over anxi- 
ety for smothering reason awaken a suspicion that you fear 
its light? How, pray, can we make up an enlightened 
judgment upon any important subject, excepting through 



14 

our reason, and the more important the subject, the greater 
the importance that we exercise upon it our soundest judg- 
ment. Does truth lose lustre by intelligent and unpreju- 
diced investigation ? Ncoer ! This is what spiritualists are 
constantly, and most earnestly pleading, that skeptics come 
up and investigate. No matter how strong the intellect, the 
more powerful the mind of the investigator, the more as 
they progress will they appreciate its glorious beauties, and 
the more they enlighten themselves upon the subject, and 
the more they progress through its teachings here, the fur- 
ther in advance will they be able to take their starting point 
hereafter. And may you be prevailed upon to investigate this 
subject, which in time, if persevered in, will place you in 
sympathy with the idea of a God, whose plan of salvation 
covers a ZL' What a glorious change must come over so 
expansive a soul as I feel well assured is that of yours, 
after so long entertaining such a narrow seven by nine 
heaven that takes in but one twelfth of the human race at 
best, to be able to spread your arms wide, and open the 
doors of your soul to their greatest tension and say, now I 
know my God will eventually save all from the least to the 
greatest ! Not a sparrow shall fall beyond the point of 
his redemption. That you may realize this glorious condi- 
tion before your time for passing 7cr, so that you may 
prepare yoxxT mind not only for a higher stand here, but for 
a more advanced position hereafter, is the most earnest 
prayer of your Sincere Friend^ 

J. B. Angell. 



J. B. Angell, 

My Dear Friend : — I perused your communication 
with care and made some notes, the substance of which I 
will give to you in this paper. 

1st, On the claim of perfection of views which christians 
make, the case is simply this : our views, or doctrines, are 



15 

taught in the holy Scriptures, they are not ours^ they are 
those laid down in that book, we have no responsibility for 
them. If the book is false, then of course we are wrong; but 
if the book is true, then our position is not only invulner- 
able, but infallible. You must fight it out with the Bible, 
and not with Christiai^s. We believe the Bible as it stands, 
you do not, therefore there is no possible ground for agree- 
ment between us except on the divine authorship or divine 
inspiration of the Scriptures. That battle has been fought 
out and won triumphantly for the Bible in every age for ten 
centuries, and it is too late in this generation to go back to 
do that work again. Every civilization for a thousand years 
is the direct outgrowth of ths Bible, and to deny the divine 
authorship of that book now is to deny the best part of all 
human history. 

2d, There never has been any such progression of religion, 
or worship, among God's people as you speak of. God's 
people have never been idolaters, except when they left the 
true God, and then they were chastened till they came back. 
The Bible taught the same doctrine, and God's people 
believed the same since Abraham's day till now. You 
would charge upon the Bible, and upon Christianity, the 
follies and errors and passions of those who have perverted 
and corrupted religion. It is just as reasonable to say 
that the Republican Government is responsible for all the 
wrongs and frauds and corruptions connected with the op- 
erations of our Government. How unfair to yourself is 
your reasoning ? 

3d, On men being condemned to punishment, you charge 
this to us^ to me. It is not my doctrine, nor my teaching 
I did not say " These shall go away into everlasting pun- 
ishment." " Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is 
not quenched. " It is the language of the Son of God ! 
You must battle it out with Him. I will say this, what I 
also preach, God never made hell for man, but for the devil 
and his angels, and man chooses to act with the devil and 



16 



serve him, so that God has no alternative but to send man 
vrith his master. Then shall he say also unto them on the 
left hand. Kead Math. 25-41 : ''Depart from me, ye cursed, 
into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels :'' 
Man loses himself. When God opens the most gracious 
way of life and sends me to proclaim it to you, and you 
refuse to accept it, but say I have a way of my own^ and are 
lost, finally, who will be to blame therefor ? Christians 
don't condemn any man, nor judge any man, but simply 
stand on the word of the eternal God. 

If I am wrong and the Bible a book of fables, then your 
doctrine will catch me, but if the Bible chance to be true, 
and you are wrong, you are last and there is no hope. Now 
who is in the safer position ? Your opposition to the Bible 
doctrine of eternal punishment is Universalism rehashed, 
and every religious system outside of Christianity fights 
this doctrine of the punishment of the wicked ; the unregen- 
erate heart of man don't like it, and resists it and denies it. 
Now let me show you just where this resistance and denial 
of thig) truth of God's word began. Look at Genesis, 3-4, 
"And the serpent said unto the woman, ye shall not surely 
die:" and you. have the origin of your faith on this doctrine. 
There is where it began, and all through the ages unbeliev- 
ing souls have been asserting these words of Satan " Ye 
shall not surely die, " Now whether you like or dislike the 
doctrine of punishment matters not to the truth of it. I 
know the natural heart does not like it no more than the 
law- breaking and wicked people in society like punishment. 
You show your unfairness when you state that only one 
in twelve are saved and the rest lost. The Bible does not 
teach that. To begin with, the infant part of the race are 
saved, which is nearly or quite one half Besides no estimate 
can bo made on which to base a conclusion. The race is 
rapidly coming to accept the gospel. The heathen races 
are coming, millions are added every year. Now if the 
great portion of the race shall accept Oarist as the Saviour, 



17 

and the world stand for many ages, yet, you see how the 
case would be changed. How ridiculous must our deduc- 
tions from our limited knowledge seem in the eyes of God ! 

I see no other points that need to be touched in your 
communication, unless the one about the use of the reason in 
Christianity. The Bible opens the widest fieM for the use 
of human reason, and nothing makes mind greater, or 
broader than to study the Bible. And probably there has 
been more of the best thought of the race expended on the 
great themes of the Bible than in any other direction. You 
seem to think I am bound in by creed, that the doctrine 
of the Bible enslaves the mind. The Bible makes mind 
free if we accept it. Like God, the Bible i? a limitless 
ocean of truth and mind can swim in it forever and be free. 
It is yourself that is bound down by one narrow and soul 
destroying system, in bondage to evil spirits, bound to re- 
ceive their vain babblings and credit their powers to make 
pictures to lead the credulous astray. You take the crea- 
ture for your guide. I take the Creator, Is there any dif- 
ference ? We shall see. 

If you would inquire the wd^y of life in the Bible, I would 
love to talk with you, but if you wish to reason against the 
Bible, I would say not until you have gone over the whole 
field of evidences for its divine inspiration and refuted them. 
Simply to say that a system or a truth is inconsistent, or 
cannot be, is the word of one man against another. The 
Bible, as it stands, has endured nearly nineteen centuries all 
the opposition of the bitterest foes and is planted in more 
hearts to-day than ever before. It will endure when all its 
opposers and foes are beaten down. 

With great respect for your candor and sincerity, but 
with sorrow over your error and over the destruction that 
awaits you if you finally reject Jesus Christ as the Son of 
God and Saviour of men, I add my prayer to this for you. 

I do most cordially invite jou to attend my ministrations 
on the Sabbath, and at other times, if you are willing to 



18 

hear what you do not believe. Because I regard you as an 
honest and true-minded man, I have hoped that the Holy- 
Spirit of God and the Word of his truth might reiach your 
understanding and conscience. Do not look upon anything 
herein as colored with personal feeling in the least, but all 
in the love of Christ. Your Sincere Friend • 



My Dear Sir: 1 have read your paper with care 

and interest. It affords me pleasure to exchange thought 
with a man who evidently is so sincere and earnest in what 
he believes to be right. When I named idol worship in my 
last, I had my mind on profane history as well as divine. 
But it seems to me there has been some broadening of lib- 
erality in the divine since Abraham. For the Christ prin- 
ciple of returning good for evil I suppose was introduced 
since Abraham. It seems that Catholicism, and Jesuitism 
had the main sway for many centuries until old stout Mar- 
tin Luther and Calvin, and somewhere the Baptists came 
in for an advance ahead. As an evidence it was a step to- 
wards greater liberality is the persecution they had to en- 
counter. Then came the Wesleys, the Unitarians, the Uni- 
versalists and the Spiritualists. These latter, I presume 
you will not admit as progressive. Here is where we 
might differ. But, I presume you will think with me that 
infant salvation is more liberal than their condemnation. 
For the paving over hell with infants not a span long, never 
did have a very pleasant sound, I presume, with either of 
us. There is where we could strike hands most cordially, 
and I am happy to feel that I can meet you thus far. Now, 
then, if we could manage in any way to call the whole race 
infants, which I fully believe we are, in comparison with 
what God has got in store for us, and you was to talk it up 
right stoutly, I think you would find your humble servant 
at your Church occasionally, ready to gather the precious 
mental jewels that would be dropping from your pulpit. 



19 

You state you thought my statement of the proportion 
lost an unfair one. The infants in your parcicular case 
makes a wide difference. But aside from the infants, I 
think my plan for estimation bears from the very facts 
the most satisfactory approach to a correct proportion of 
the lost to the saved, of any I have ever seen. It was ex- 
plained in my pamphlet. You may have forgotten it. I 
will restate it. 

The general estimate, in round numbers, of the race is 
ten hundred millions, two-thirds of which, as put down by 
geographers, are heathen, which leaves 333,000,000 about 
for tho Christian countries. Now, it is estimated that in 
the Christian countries there is, some say, one to four, 
others, one to five, that are actual members of some church ; 
in the United States it is one to four, including the Catho- 
lics. Now, one-fourth of 333,000,000 is nearly 83 millions, 
which is about one twelveth of 1,000,000,000. But, as I 
there stated, if my statistics are not entirely correct, if the 
real number is a little more or a little less, it would only 
alter the degree, not the principle in the least. You say 
the Bible does not teach the proportion lost. This is not a 
Bible question ; it depends upon statistics outside the Bible. 
It appears to me the above is the most satisfactory approxi- 
mation to the proportion lost that I ever saw made, and 
that your term unfairness in the case, is not warrantable. 
You say the heathen are being converted, hence, they 
cannot be estimated. Now, I very much doubt whether 
the converted more than keep pace with the increase of 
the population, hence, it would not alter the proportion. 
You state that civilization has advanced since the Ortho- 
dox religion prevailed. Does that prove that still more 
progressive steps higher up the ladder would not make 
still greater advances. In some instances you have op- 
posed progress. Astronomy was headed off in Galileeo's 
time with the whole force of the then prevailing religion, 
and Geology was opposed with bitterness, and Phrenol- 



20 

ogy did not escape fierce invectives being hurled at it, 
and now Spiritualism (the presentation of -which is the 
greatest of any single step in advance since the history 
of man) is opposed by the whole Orthodox force, with a 
vehemence- and fierceness only hmited by their capacity 
for not being able to do more. But with all this opposi- 
tion, it has made unprecedented strides in its progress. 
Some four or five years ago the Catholics had a conven- 
tion in Baltimore of their highest dignitaries, such as 
Bishops and Archibshops, and in the course of their de- 
liberations they gave the statistics of the various de- 
nominations in the United States, and after naming the 
number of each they then summed up, stating that the 
whole number, including their own, amounted to about 
nine millions, and that the Spiritualists outnumbered 
them all, for they figured up some eleven milhons. 

Now I presume there is no body so thoroughl}^ qualified 
for rendering correct statistics as the Catholics, and this, 
mind you, was some 4 or 5 years ago. And there is no rea- 
son to suppose that they would put down a greater num- 
ber than they thought there was. This statement as<^onished 
the most of the Spiritualists, for they have no general organi- 
zation or means for positive estimation, But Judge Edmonds, 
who is qualified as well as any other individual to judge 
of their true numbers, gave it as his opinion that the 
Catholics were correct, for he said there were hosts of 
believers who had not the courage to come out for fear of 
their popularity. He said he had received letters from Minis- 
ters asking his advice what they should do, for they 
had received evidence so direct, they could not deny its 
truth. And this gain has been established by positive, unde- 
niable facts, for no one can say that these people have been 
led to this belief from their prejudices, or for popularity, 
or for position, but they have been made by positive, living, 
facts in spite of all these influences directly to the contrary. 
Judge Edmonds himself was broken down from the high- 



21 

est Judiciary position in the State of N. Y. on account of 
his expressing his convictions of the truth of Spiritualism. 
They pronounced him insane. (A short time ago I saw 
it stated in a paper, that his judgment as counsellor at law 
brought him in some thirty thousand dollars per year, 
and they further stated, it was a pretty good income for 
the market value of the counsel of a crazy man.; 

Who are those that positively ascert that Spiritualism is 
true ? It is those who have investigated, and amongst 
those are men of the strongest minds. And who are those 
that say Spiritualism is not true ? It is those who have 
not investigated. Now, who ought to know best ? In 
speaking of the pictures I described to you in my last, you 
wound up by telling me I am worshipping the creature, 
you the Creator. Then you say we shall see ; we Spiritual- 
ists already see. There is no necessity for waiting until we 
pass over for us to see. The evidence is coming more and 
more amongst us, and is presenting itself in more and more 
positive and vivid forms. The spirits of our departed 
friends, as a rule, are more anxious even than we are, that 
we seek for mediums, so that they can inform us of their 
beautiful conditions, and of their nearness to us. - For they 
can, if they choose, place themselves so that they can ob- 
serve our daily walks, and rejoice when we conduct our- 
selves in a commendable manner, one towards another, or 
deeply mourn over us when we make ourselves miserable by 
leading miserable lives. Now 1 most positively assert, 
that if you were to investigate this subject with an earnest- 
ness anything in proportion to the importance of it, that 
before six months passed over your head, you would re- 
ceive evidence of its truth, of such a positive nature, that 
you would have to deny your senses to den}^ it. And sup- 
pose 3^ou do not investigate does that alter the facts ? 
You must take into consideration that in the main. Spirit- 
ualists are brought to their convictions when their minds 
are matured, not mainly while they are young, and some of 



22 

them, mere children, as it were, surrounded by large num- 
bers with their magnetism all concentrated in one direc- 
tion, and their feelings and fears wrought upon by intel- 
lects capable of making such appliances tell in tbeir most 
effectual manner. In my estimation, there is not one per- 
son in fifty, under the age of sixteen, with fair mtelligence, 
that could go through such an ordeal if persevered in 
without being powerfully wrought upon, (I have had some 
powerfully vivid experiences of these things myself, but not 
until I was old enough to think for myself.) Eut Spiritu- 
alists are not converted in any such manner. The facts, 
as a rule, are presented in an unmistakable form, with the 
intellect left free to exercise its judgment upon it, and why 
is its convictions, under all these adverse circumstances, 
making such unprecedented head -way ? Because it con- 
vinces the intellect, through the senses, under the full play 
of the soundest judgment. When a person sees, and hears 
and feels, a thing, under circumstances where there cannot 
possibly be any deception, he becomes convinced in spite of 
himself. If I was to go on board of a steamboat and saw 
the engineer turn on the steam, end gaw that steam start 
up the machinery, and feel the motion of the boat, and see 
that she is moving directly against the wind and tide, and 
know there can be no deception, can I doubt there is in 
steam, under proper conditions, a propelling quality ? 

In most instances seeing alone is conclusive as in those 
spirit photographs I described to you in my last. How 
could the likeness of the child come there except from 
the child's spirit ? They were entire strangers to Mr. 
Mumler, he knew nothing of their history or aflOictions 
■until after the pictures were taken. And there was an- 
other point presented at this trial to show there was no 
deception. A neighboring photographist got Mumler 
to go into his own office and use his neighbor's imple- 
ments throughout, giving the privilege to watch aU the 
manipulations throughout, and the spirit pictures were 
produced the same, (this was aU sworn to in court.) 



22 

You speak of these pictures very lightly. To be sure 
an ordinary picture of itself is of no great import. ISTei- 
ther is the falling of an ordinary apple much of an af- 
fair. But when the apple falls before the genius of a 
Newton, that suggests to him the laws that govern the 
motions of the universe, the import of that particular 
apple was tremendous. So, if the rendering these pic- 
tures gives to us a key that opens the door so that we 
can freely look in and learn the positive conditions of 
our eternal future ! Why, the faUing of that New- 
toinan apple was nothing compared with it. 

You say God made hell for the Devil and his angels, 
not for man, but if man disobeyed his laws it obhged 
God to send him with the devil. History tells us that 
man, the heathen portion especially, way down as far as 
the record reaches, finds him but little above the beasts 
of the field, perfectly incapable of a worship higher than 
the grossest idols, and it evidently run onwith some shades 
of improvements for thousands of years before a Christ 
was heard of. Now, was man responsible for his low 
condition ? Was it his work that he was first started so 
low in the scale of existence ? What a curious statement, 
to say God made hell, not for man, and then made man 
in such a low condition that he could not conduct himself 
in any other way than that God, according to your plan, 
must, from necessity, turn him over to the Devil and his 
angels, and continue to do so for thousands of years, and 
even now nearly two thousand years since Christ's ad- 
vent, the knowledge of it has been conducted through 
such narrow channels, that even yet a great portion of 
the human race never heard of him, and are lost without 
a possibility of escape. Is this the limitless ocean for 
Eeason, Justice, and Mercy, and an enlarged idea of God 
to swim in ? 

You speak about the divinity of the Bible, I heartily 
agree with you in the divinity of the truths in the Bible, 



24 

such as laid down by Christ in doing unto others as you 
would that they should do unto you, Love thy neighbor 
as thyself ; Eeturn good for evil, which sayings were so 
emphatically backed up by his life. This, in my estima- 
tion, is divine in its highest sense. But passages that 
contain in them injustice, vengeance and retahation, in 
my estimation there is not Bible hds thick enough, or 
theological talent, single or combined, strong enough to 
make such passages as those divine. And any denom- 
ination, single or combined, that undertakes to carry 
in theu' creed, such a load, has got in it the seeds of de- 
struction. As I liave said before in my pamphlet, you 
may soda wash the stock and branches, and get up a fit- 
ful resemblance of vivid Hf e, but if you leave the grub 
worm of injustice girdhng at the roots, in time the whole 
tree will surely perish, " This is one of Gods's immu- 
table laws. 

You say that Spiritualism is Universahsm rehashed. 
Why, one would think that you was terribly alarmed for 
fear something would happen that would make our God 
to be a hberal God. That he had so arranged his plans 
that he would eventually save the whole of his children. 

Why, Mr. , what a short-sighted, unf eehng God 

that would be ! 

Your statement about your extra safety, providing my 
course is false, would be all very well if there was any 
doubts, but, as I know there is none, it is not of the 
least consequence. It would be something hke this. If 
a man was in the habit of carrying his grain in bags 
upon his mule's back, balanced with a stone in one end, 
and you was to come along, and, seeing how the case 
was, you would naturally tell him if he would take out 
the stone and divide the grain he could carry twice the 
amount of grain as easy as one-half in the old way. But, 
by the way, you might add, I think you had better take 
the stone with you for fear the grain-dividing principle 
might fail you. 



25 

Now, Mr. — , that devil and hell business yon 

speak of in your last wliich seems to me to so trouble 
you to fix up, even to your own satisfaction, is all a myth. 
I never, from the earliest moment of my recollection, en- 
tertained the least doubt upon that point. And, since 
Spiritualism has opened the doors between this and the 
other life, now, I know there is nothing of the kind. 

In my estimation, there is not a man that walks the 
streets of your city, (I am in earnest) that has a truer sense 
of justice ihan you have. Neither do I believe there is 
one that has less vindxtiveness ia his nature, and how 
you should have been caught in a doctrine that has hang- 
ing to it this old relic of barbarism is passing strange to 
me. I cannot account for it in any othpr way, than that 
you was brought in^o this way of thought when you was 
too young to give it a serious consideration. In that made 
good the saying of the poet, first endured, then pitied, 
then embraced. If you theologians had taken half the 
pains to explain out these eternal punishment passages, 
that you do to explain out the passages that support Uni- 
tarianism, Universalism, and Spiritualism, these offensive 
passages would have become obsolete centuries ago, and 
there would not have been any necessity for my trying to 
explain to 3^ou their demoralizing effects, and of your 
dodging behind them, and begging me to fire at them, not 
at 3^ou. 

I will give a few points that come to my mind of our 
experience within the last half century. There was men- 
tal philosophy, which was considered so profound a subject 
that it enlisted minds of the deepest thought, such as 
Brown, Lock, Bacon, &c., who spent the main part of their 
lives ill writing and lecturing upon the subject. But not 
long since there came forth Gall, Spurzeim, and Combs-, 
who had discovered avud mainly matured the science of 
phrenology, which gave us so simple a key to the work- 



26 



ings of the mental organization, tliat a student of moderate 
capacity could learn more of the real science of the mind 
in a few weeks, than scores of these profoundest phil- 
osophers could tell us under their form in the whole 
course of their existence. 

Then, again, but a few years ago, comparatively, we 
were sending messages by belted Indians, re. ays of horses, 
and locomotives, the last of which we thought was won- 
derful quick. But, not long since, Morse matured a plan 
so that a man now can step into his office with his plans, 
well matured, and can send a question to the remotest 
bounds of the earth, and get an answer back before 
you can fairly begin to get up the steam in a locomotive. 

Then, as it regards our religion. As you truly say 
"Probvably, there has been more of the best thought of the 
race expended upon the Bible than in any o ther direction." 
Theologians by millions have spent their lives, and their 
profoundest thought, in propounding to us how we must 
conduct ourselves to attain our best condition in the here- 
after, and what would probably be our condition there. 
Now, Spiritualism has presented itself, and has opened the 
doors between this and the future, so that our departed 
friends and others can come forth and proclaim to us their 
experiences in their new life, and tell us their conditions, 
there, and also tell us how we must conduct ourselves to 
attain our best conditions when our time comes for passing 
over. With these advantages, a man of fair intelligence 
with a good medium, and surrounded with proper condi- 
tions, can get more knowledge about our conditions in the 
eternal future in a few hours than the whole array of 
Theologians from the time the race began could tell us 
(without this aid) in their life time. ^^ 

The so called Orthodoxy has been preached and advoca- 
ted with its strongest mental lights for thousands of years, 
and here in the United States it has had its fullest freedom 



27 

to promulgate its ideas. And no w as light advances with such 
increased velocity, it is becoming terribly alarmed about 
its stability, and feels faint, and weak, to that extent 
that it is marshaling its forces to try to prevail upon 
Congress to put forth its strong arm and try to save it 
from topling over ! 

Does Astronomy, Geology, Phrenology, Magnetic Tel- 
egraphy, Spiritualism, Love thy neighbour as thyself, 
Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you do you 
even so to them. Do truths of this character fear intel- 
ligent investigation ? Never, The more thoroughly you in- 
vestigate, and the harder you rub a truth the stronger 
and brighter it grows! It is error, malignant error, that 
fears the light. 

I tell you Mr. we are blest with the privilege of 

living in the midst of stirring events ! so much so that if a 
man drives down his stake and closes the shutters of his 
soul in every other direction, he will stand a mighty 
lively chance of waking up some morning and finding him- 
self wonderfully behind the times! 

May 3^ou be prevailed upon to open wide the shutters of 
your soul and may the light of truth shine therein, and 
may it take root, and bring forth to you an abundant har- 
vest, is the sincere desire of your friend indeed, 

J. B. Angell. 



Mr. J. B. Angell: 

My Dear Friend : — I received and read with care 
yours which came to hand a few days ago. I will notice 
a few points. It is singular with what tenacity the op- 
posers of the religion of Jesus hold to old and exploded 
objections to Christian doctrines. For instance, you quote 
and evidently believe, the doctrine of infant damnation, 
using the worn out slur against the salvation by Christ, of 
" paving hell with infants;" etc. I am sure the objector 



28 

to Christianity has well nigh spent himself, when he feels 
the necessity of using that argument. My friend, don't 
you know that the Church of Jesus Christ has never held 
that doctrine ; and on the contrary, has ever held to the 
salvatian of infants, and that through Jesus Christ. Some 
individuals may have put forth the doctrine you refer 
to 5 but the authorities of Christ's Church, in every age, 
have held forth none other than that we now teach, viz., 
the salvati. n of all those who are not responsible for their 
own acts or state. We need not discuss further the pro- 
portion of the saved to the lost. That can only be esti- 
mated at the close of of the world^ when the figures are all 
in. It is a question that belongs to God, and not to us. 
"When Jesus was asked about this matter, by one curious 
to know how many, etc., he said, " Strive to enter in at the 
straight gate, for many I say unto you shall seek to enter 
in, and shall not be able." Luke, xiii,, 34. And again he 
said, ** Except ye repent^ ye shall all likewise perish.'^ 
Luke, iii., 5. Ponder these words of Christ, my friend, 
and rest assured they will abide true. Your attempt to 
put Unitarianism, Universalism, Spiritualism, etc., into 
the company of Christianity, almost causes an audible 
smile. No, no, my friend, that won't do ; the wolf may 
have the sheep's clothing, but his nature is the same still. 
You cannot talk of all these isms as steps in the ladder 
of progress. Christianity alone is the progressive power 
in the world. Christ is the life, as he is the light of men. 
Kead John's Gospel, first chapter. In what part of the 
world has there been light, or a progressive civilization, 
where Christ is not preached as the only Saviour and 
Son of God ? That clouds of ignorance and superstition 
have darkened the truth, is true, but Christ truly 
preached gives light and life to man. I don't wonder, 
therefore, that all these anti-christianisms want to get 
into the company of Christianity, and be stamped as 
sharing its glories. But they rise and fall, they get their 



29 

skin torn off by and "by, and then flee out of sight, to 
come up in some other form. They shall perish, but 
He endureth forever. 

Now, supposing all you say about the numbers of 
Spiritualists is true, it proves nothing, unless the people 
have a great capacity in this age to swallow error. See 
how Mahomedanism spread, and how long it has held on. 
Does that prove that it is God's true doctrine and way of 
salvation of men? Your statement about Spiritualism, 
proves the Gospel to be true '' Little children, it is the 
last time : and as ye have heard that Anti christ shall 
come, even now are there many Anti-christs ; whereby 
we know *that it is the last time'" 1 John, xii., 18. 
'* Now the spirit ppeaketh expressly, that in the latter 
times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to 
seducing sjnrits and doctrines of devils; 2d. Speaking lies 
in hypocrisy, having their conscience seared with a hot 
iron ; 3d. Forbidding to marry." 1 Timothy, iv., 1, 3. 
God will cause the wrath of men to praise him. He 
makes them prove his word true by their false doctrines. 
It is truly a hard way to travel to oppose God. 

Now a word about investigating. Jugglery and the 
black arts have been in existence since the devil gained sway 
over man, and has been carried to such a point of com- 
pleteness, that one unacquainted with it cannot explain 
its works. But must I therefore assent to whatever expla- 
nation the practicers of that art put upon it ? 1 have not 
the least doubt, but the great deceiver of man, the devil, 
makes full use of Spiritualism to ruin the souls of men. 
There are no doubt subtle laws ruling mind and matter, 
and subtle forces within us, which we do not understand, 
and here is a mysterious field for devils and wicked persons 
to work in, and to get up a system which persons of enor- 
mous credulity will receive, when substituted for the true 
religious belief. Man will believe almost anything that 
does not disturb him in his sins. Now, when you tell 



ao 

me that you receive fresh communications from your 
departed wife, but that they were first delivered to a man 
in whom you nor the community have confidence as 
to the purity and integrity of his moral character, I must 
be permitted to think you are wofully duped. If your 
dear wife had power and priveledge to communicate with 
you, would she not come directly to you, and not go to 
some one by whom she wou'.d not have sent a message of 
love when living ? No, no, my friend, there is too much 
humhuggery in all these pretended communications from 
the other world for me to undertake to investigate. Look 
at the writings of the so-called mediums ; did any one 
ever see such stuff as is attempted to be palmed off for the 
productions of the great minds of the dead? I once 
heard a woman reel off stuff she called poetry, while she 
was in a medium state. It was made up as she went 
along, every word of it, and when she could not get ho^d 
of a word, she would choke and take on at a great rate to 
get time. Humbug, I said then, and have changed my 
view only in the addition of one other element humbug and 
deviltry, 

I do not mean to cast any reproach upon yourself nor 
the multitude of honest minded persons, like yourself, who 
sincerely hold to the belief. I mean by humhuggery, de- 
ception, I feel you are deceived, caught in a net of mys- 
terious meshes, which is hauled by the devil. I can speak 
plain about the system or isniy and not reproachfully or 
disrespectfully of those who hold it. I have very dear 
friends who are caught just as you are, and I pray for 
them, as I do for you, that they may be delivered before it 
shall be too late. 

I must beg to ccrre t you in one point. History does 
not show that man ^^ as started low down in the scale of 
culture and intelligence. That is a theory of tho.se who 
oppose the Bible. Darwin would start us from the ape, 
or lower still, from the mere pulpy, jelly-like substance 



{ 



81 

that clings to rocks in water or floats. And so sceptics 
ever would start man at the level of the brute. But man 
before the flood was as intelligent as 4,000 years after. 
Adam, doubt .'ess, was more of a man than we are, and so 
in everj age down, man has not lacked intelligence. See 
the races that have ever dwelt on the Asiatic continent; 
their civiiization goes back to the first. So your objec- 
tion to my statement goes for nothing. You suppose a 
state of things that has not a ►'shadow of reality about it^ 
and then would prove your case, or disprove my statement 
by it. That won't do. 

I perfectly agree with jow in your statement, that a 
book or creed that embodies the principles, or teaches *^ in 
justice, vengence, and retaliation," cannot continue long, 
and ought not to. But that is not true with the Bible, nor 
with any creed founded on the Bible. The Bible teaches 
justice, mercy, love, and teaches that God is love. Look 
at this : ^Tor God so loved the world, that he gave h's 
only begotten Son, that whosoever belie veth in him, 
should not perish, but have everlasting life " 

" For God sent not his Son into the world, to condemn 
the worM, but that the world through him might be 
saved." 

"lie that believeth on him, is not condemned: but he that 
beleiveth not, is condemned already, because he hath not 
believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God," 
Jjlin 3-16. Now can there be any higher evidence of God's 
love for man than this ? Look at it and ponder it. One 
great error in your belief is that man does not need regen- 
eration, that he may be educated and trained up to love God 
and his neighbor so as to be like God, holy and pure. Well, 
the word cf God teaches otherwise, and Jesus taught other- 
wise, and I must follow the word of God. You speak 
absolutely positive in j^our knowledge about the things of a 
future state, so much so that it looks suspicious. At least, 
you must base your belief on communication of spirits, 



32 

and I believe you acknowledge there are lying spirits. Let 
him that thinks he stands take heed lest he fall. 

Let me call your mind to the great religious awakening 
now going on in this land. By the preaching of the doc- 
trine of salvation through Jesus Christ and by prayer, these 
spiritual awakenings have come down all over the land in 
a marvelous way. Doubtless half a million souls have been 
and will be converted to Christ and begin to live his life this 
winter. I must send you the account of this in St. Louis. 
It is simply impossible to explain it on mere human causes. 
Well, while you and others are fighting Christ and his re- 
ligion, he is moving the land and turning hundreds of 
thousands to himself. In every age his enemies are going 
to have his old doctrine die out , and new truths are to 
take their place ; but they don't die, they live and save, 
isms die and the opposers of Christ and his church pass 
away. 

I want you to read the 72d psalm which refers to Christ. 
Also this verse in 89th psalm which also refers to Christ. 
" His seed (disciples) shall endure for ever, and his throne 
as the sun before me.'' 

But I will close this by saying, that God would save 
you, and all who will come to him through Christ ; but if 
you prefer, like tho prodigal, to feed on the husks, then he 
can't save you, and that your eternal loss will not be on 
God's hands, but on your own hands. You have rejected 
the way of salvation given in his word, and chosen a way 
of your own, you have assumed all the responsibility. 

1 Cor., iii., 11. "For other foundation can no man 
lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.'^ Jno., x., 1. 
*' Verily, verily, I say unto you. He that come th not by 
the door into the sheepfold, but cometh up some other 
way, the same is a thief and a robber." 

But why should I point you to these words of God's 
book. You have put them aside, and have other things 
to put in their stead. 0, how fearful will be your sur- 



33 



prise, when you wake by and by, and find that the Bible, 
this old book of Christians, the guide and comfort of 
Christ's hosts, toas true^ after all. The apostate Julian 
said on his dying bed, while his soul was in awful agony, 
*^0, Galileean, thou has conquered at last.'' All who 
oppose Christ will say that at last 5 for every knee shall 
bow to him, and every tongue confess that he is the Lord. 

I do not feel that you are coming at all nearer to Christ ; 
but rather fighting against him, and against his loving 
kingdom. But I shall yet pray for you, that you may 
throw up that shadowy, vague, uncertain system, that 
has brought nothing good to the world yet, and accept of 
the truth as it was revealed in Jesus Christ. I wish you 
would come to my church, at least once in a while. I 
treat every kind of belief fairly, and do most certainly 
love all my fellow men, and want to see them saved from 
the punishment of their sins. 

Yours, sincerely. 



*WHAT IS DEATH? 

The erroneous ideas on this subject which have for so 
long a time been inculcated by the theology of the day 
and the consequently false opinions which have prevailed 
among men, will evidently require much time and many 
teachings to correct. Such teachings, however, are now 
and for a quarter of a century have been coming with 
increasing frequency and it seems to me to be the manifest 
duty of those who receive them to give them to the world. 

Acting under that impression, I have already made public 
much on the subject, and now add to the number the fol- 



* I sent Mr this communication, marked in the Banner of 

Lights to illustrate to him, that with those who conducted them- 
selves properly, how quiet and easy was their transition from this 
to the other life and how natural and pleasant was their ex- 
perience while entewng upon this other life. 



34 

lowing, which I have lately received from one of the victims 
of the late collision at sea between the steamer Yille 
Du Havre and a British sailing vessel. 

Judge Peckham was a member of the Court of Appeals 
of New York — the highest Court in the State — and had 
acquired a high reputation as a jurist. He took passage 
with his wife in the steamer, and died in the bloom of his 
manhood and in the full vigor of his intellect; so that he 
was fully competent to comprehend and relate all that 
occured around him. His spirit came to me lately, and 
identifying himself to my satisfaction, gave me the following 
communication, which I now transcribe in the precise 
language in which I received it. 

J. W, EPMONDS. 

Mw York, Feb. Uth, 1874. 



My Deak Friend — I shall waive all ceremony with you 
and enter upon this, our interview, not assuming but 
knowing that you are aware of my presence almost as 
tangibly as when I last met you in Albany, in the Court 
Eoom where you and I had listened and tried to be still, 
out of respect to the majesty of the law. You left the 
Court Room in advance of me. T tried to see you figain, but 
you left that evening. We meet again here under different 
circumstances. I will not say I am from the Higher Court 
to-day, for as yet I have found no court or sphere into 
which your thoughts, which represent your spirit, do not 
come. Hence there are no severed links in our friendship 
when we still sit in council with those we knew and loved. 

Had I have chosen the manner of my departure from the 
body, I should not have selected the one to which I was 
obliged to succumb. However, I find no fault, now that 
I realize the life which has opened before mc so suddenly, 
so strangely. 

In the dying moments I lived my life all over. Every 



35 

scene, every act passed before me as vividly as if written 
on my brain with living light. Not a friend that I had 
known in early or later lif j was forgotten. I saw, as I 
sank, with my wife f jlded to my heart, my mother and 
father. The former lifted me out of the wave with a 
strength which I can at this moment feel, and I have no 
recollection of suffering. 

From the moment that i Knew the waves would engulf 
us, I liad no sensation of fear, of cold, or of suffocation, I 
did not hear the waves break. I parted with that which 
was my body, and, with my wife still in my arms, followed 
my mother whither she led me. 

The first sad thought was for my dear brother. This my 
motbersawand felt, and at once said, " Your brother will soon 
be with you!'' From that moment sorrow seemed to fade 
away, and I sat down to look about upon the scene through 
which I had so recently passed. I felt solicitude for my 
fellow-passengers; looked for them and saw them being lifted 
out of the waves in precisely the same manner that your 
strong arm, nerved by love, would lift your drowning 
child from the great waves which would swollow him up. 

For a time this appeared so real, that, had it not have 
been for the presence of those whom I knew to be dead, I 
should have believed myself acting as rescuer with the 
spirits. 

I write plainly to you, hoping that you will send words 
of comfort to those who imagine that their friends suffered 
mortal agony in drowning. 

There was a fulfilment of that glorious triumph of faith, 
and the shadow of death became an illumination, which 
enabled so many to say that death's waves were swollow- 
ed up in the victory which love hath brought to light in 
the ministry of angels and spirits. 

I need not tell you the greetmgs which awaited me when 
the many, whom you and I knew and loved, welcomed me 



36 

tothe realms of the life immortal. Not having been sick 
or suffering, I was ready at once to accept facts, and to 
move forward to the attractions which, if on earth's plane, 
have the power to charm away sorrow, how much more en- 
chanting here, where the scene has changed so quickly, so 
gloriously, that we do not murmur at the haste, nor think 
that it is disappointment or accident that summoned us 
unceremoniously hither ! 

lam aware that many will ask, if we could be he'ped to 
pass out of the body without pain, why could not the ac- 
cident have been prevented ? In our investigations we 
have learned this fact, namely, that the officer in charge 
was so entirely deceived in regard to the distance between 
the Loch Earn and his own vessel, that no power on earth 
or that which the spirit- world could bring to bear, could 
have prevented it. Hence the collision was inevitable. 
There are conditions of sight, particularly on the water, 
when the water will seem to possess a power of deception 
almost marvelous and past belief. The ablest and best 
are liable to these conditions, particularly at just the 
position that these vessels must have been in. Hence 
there should be no blame attached to that man. It is 
done, arid the survivors most need sympathy, and I know 
of no way to give it more direct than to assure them 
that their loved friends are not slumbering in the caverns 
cf the deep awaiting the final trump to sound, but that at 
all times they await and look for the proper channels 
through which to echo the unmistakable evidence of life 
immortal. 

My thanks are due to our mutual friends, Tallmadge, 
Van Buren, Hill* and many others, for this delightful re- 



* The allusion here Is to N. P. Tallmadge, TJ. S. Senator, Pre- 
sident Yan Buren, and Nicholas Hill, formerly an eminent 
lawyer at Albany, all of whom have frequently communed with 
me. 

J. W. E. 



37 

union with you ; nor can I end it without thanking you 
for a faith which, although silent between us, made me to 
respect you the more. I have come now into that nearer 
circle o£ friendship which I shall cherish as I know you 
will — sacred as the love which makes us to rejoice in one 
Great and All- wise Father, who doeth all things well. 

Craving pardon for the length of my letter, I promise 
you and myself still further intercourse with your friend. 

RuFUS W. Peckham. 



Mr. J. B, Angell, 

My Dear Friend : — I have read the letter pre- 
tending to be from Judge Peckham, and I felt to say when 
I had finished it, and looked it over again, if that is all 
you have to say about that strange midnight scene on the 
dark ocean, why should you have pretended to speak to us 
at all? My friend, you have too much mind, if j'ou 
would use it rightly, to be deceived by letters and com- 
munications of this sort, claimed to be sent from the 
other world. 

Does that world so weaken mind, does it so remove its 
occupants from the realms of facts and good sense, as to 
leave them to send us nothing but the wishy washy stuflf, 
the childish twadle and nonsense that is claimed to come 
from them ? 

If my son, twelve years of age, should go to Europe, 
and not write me more reasonable and intelligent letters* 
setting forth facts in a more intelligent way, than all the 
pretended communications that ever I have read from the 
other world do, I would write him not to send me any 
more letters, till he had spent some time under tutors. 

Now, there is one thing in Judge Peekham's pretended 
letter, that exposes the whole thing as a sham, to my 
mind. This he says, " write, tell friends of the lost that 



38 

tlieir friends are not sleeping in the caverns of the deep, 
but are with him in the other world." 

If the spirit of Judge P. ever dictated that letter, he 
must be either willfally false, (and this he was not when 
on the earth,) or have become very ignorant in the other 
world. For the Bible does not teach that the spirits of 
the dead remain in the grave, or in the deep, but go to 
God who gave them. And I never heard of any sect who 
took the Bible for their guide, that did believe as the 
letter indicates. 

I really do not think there is much danger of the world 
all being swallowed up in Spiritualism. 

Yours, truly, 



Mr. 



My Dear Friend : — 1 received your third letter 
and perused it with care. And in the starting, I perceive 
in respect to the redemption of infants, you have some 
tow or other entirely misunderstood me. For you say, 
2 quote, and evidently believe, the doctrine of infant 
damnation, using the worn out slur against the salvation 
by Christ, of paving over hell with infants, etc. Now, 
my notes tell me, which I copied my letter from to you. 
*• But I presume, you will think with me, that the infant 
salvation is more liberal than their condemnation ; for the 
old paving the streets of hell with infants, not a span long, 
never did have a very pleasant sound, I presume, with 
either of us. There is where we could strike hands most 
cordially, and I am happy to feel that I can meet you thus 
far, etc." 

Now, T think this whole sentence, as far as I have 
copied, and to the end, carries upon the face of it, a vein 
of pleasantry. That certainly was the light I intended it 



39 

should be received in, and certainly it cannot be construed 
into a slur upon your doctrine, for you had stated you did 
not advocate it. You J^ay that there is no denomination, 
as a body, that do advocate it. Well, I am happv to hear 
it. At the time I wrote I did not know. But this I know, 
there are individuals who said they believed it, and preach- 
ed it too. And if what I said is construed into a slur, it 
hits them, not you. I did not intend it as a slur for any 
one. And, then, pray, how did you come at the idea that 
I evidently believed in infantile damnation ? Why, I have 
told you before, I have never believed in the eternal dam- 
nation of any soul, from the beginning of man up, and so 
on throughout eternity, much less, if it is possible, do I 
believe in the damnation of infants ! 

You state, we need not discuss further the proportion 
saved to the lost, that can only be estimated ai; the close 
of the world, when the figures are all in. My estimation 
was for the proportion lost to the saved at present, not for 
the future, or the past. Since I wrote you last, I have 
come into possession of a book, giving a short history of 
all Christian sects, and an introductory account of 
Deist, Jews, Mahomedans, Pagans, etc., published by 
John Evans, L. L. D. And he puts down the approximate 
numbers of all those who belong to reformed churches, at 
sixty millions, which figures up about oi|^ in seventeen 
that are saved. If I had gone into an estimation of t e 
proportion lost, to those saved, from the commencement 
of the race up to the present time, and taken into con- 
sideration the four thousand years of generations that 
had passed off before any being saved, and then at Christ's 
advent the saving commenced at a point, and now after 
nearly two thousand years widening, and in its best condi- 
tion there is only about one in twelve saved ; thus, taking 
it from the beginning, under these plain circumstances, 
what an unmistakable small amount it must be of those 
that have been saved, to those that have been lost, per- 



40 

haps, not one in a thousand. I am thus particular in these 
points, so as to show you how near an utter failure, ac- 
cording to your doctrine, has been thus far God's plan of 
salvation. And I have used figures as much as I could 
for their meaning is not so easily mistaken, neither are 
they so easily staved off. We cannot in the main only 
speculate about the future. But there is this much for a 
basis to speculate upon. According to the Bible account, the 
world has been in existence about six thousand years, and 
the Christian religion has existed about two thousand 
years, and in the course of six thousand years we have 
gained about ten hundred millions, it is no ways probable 
but the last third of the time has gained fully its pro- 
portion of the ten hundred millions. Hence, while the 
race has been gaining between three and four hundred 
millions, protestantism has only gained from sixty to 
about eighty millions. At this ratio, if the world should 
exist many thousand years, the proportion saved to those 
lost, would be reduced to a pretty small point. 

You seemed to be wonderfully astonished that I should 
consider Unitarianism, Universalism and Spiritua ism, 
more advanced than jouv Christianity. Now I alwaj^s 
considered, the more liberal a class of people were, the 
more they were advanced. According to Mr. Evans, the 
Unitarians and Universal ists each, have about the 
same number of passages in the Bible, to support their 
faith, that your doctrine has, and they speak out as con- 
clusively in their direction, as yours does in your direc- 
tion j hence it is certainly more liberal to make choice of 
those passages that prove that God saves the whole of his 
children, than to choose those passages that makes God 
save but a small part. Mr. Evans does not say anything 
^hout Spiritualism, but this comes in for an ample support 
from the same source, and you say these doctrines are 
wolves in sheep's clothing. Is not a generous idea more 



41 

in accordance wth the character of the lamb, than a vin- 
dictive one ? You carry the idea that your doctrine is 
not vindictive. Does a true father ever punish his child, 
excepting for the child's good ? But if for an oftence 
of his child, he should, if he could, punish him through- 
out eternity, does not that put H beyond the possibility of 
its being for the child's good, and does it not become at 
once a vindictive punishment, a punishment of vengeance, 
and is this not more in accordance with the character of 
the wolf, than Unitarianism, XJniversrlism, and Spiritual- 
ism, who punish only for the child's good, and when you 
try to make out that your God is a God of love, and of 
supreme liberality, is it not tr^nng to cover a doctrine po- 
sessing a wolfish principle with sheep's clothing? It ap- 
pears to me that certainly when you say that these 
doctrines are wolves in sheep's clothing, you have put the 
boot on the wrong leg. I am thus plain, because it seems . 
at times you try to stave ofiP, by speaking lightly of my 
statements in favor of Spiritualism, and making much of 
that in favor of your position. You first say that you 
can bring such a cloud of witnesses to prove the truth of 
your doctrine, that it ought to convince any man. Then, 
by and by, when I tell you, that according to our best in- 
formation, that the number of witnesses in favor of 
Spiritualism outnumbers all other denominations, you 
directly say, that is no proof of its truth, and call my 
attention to the spread of Mahomedanism, as a proof of it, 
forgetting- at the same time that that proof is just as good 
against your cloud of witnesses, as it is against, mine. 
An(^ immediately you send me a slip of paper, giving a 
glowing account of the revival that is taking place in the 
city of St. Louis, and, according to the various accounts, it 
is pretty general throughout the country ; and you state 
you think that there must be half a million added to the 
church this winter, and you seem to think you see the hand 



42 



of God in it, (I think by referring back you will find in times 
of p mic, there has been a corresponding movement in the re- 
ligious line,) and when I prove to you that Spiritualism has 
averaged nearly half a million of converts right along from 
one year to another, (converts that generally stay, too, 
there are not many backsliders from spiritualism,) not by 
taking the advantage of panics, not by employing your 
De Witts, and Hammonds, who are peculiarly adapted for 
working upon the feelings and fears of mainly youths and 
children, but mainly by the works of the very spirits 
themselves, who are daily presenting witnesses by scores, of 
such a startling and conclusive character that if they had 
occurred two thousand years ago, you would have called 
them miracles sent by God to prove his divinity; but if 
they occur now you call it all the works of the devil ! 

What is the general idea of the character of your devil ? 
I believe the general idea is that he is intensely vindictive 
in his nature, utterly void of principle, or a generous feel- 
ing, and the more intensely miserable he can make those 
who come under his dominions, the greater does he feel 
glorified, and that the most precious moments of his enjoy- 
ment is when he can look down upon his subjects wreath- 
ing in the most intense suffering and agony, feeling at the 
same time the superlative satisfaction that this is to last 
them throughout eternity! And what is the character of 
this spiritualistic devil you speak of so derisively? It is to 
go up and down the land healing the sick and suffering, 
making the blind to see, the deaf to hear, the lame and 
bed-ridden to arise and walk, and up they straightway 
get and do walk, and the general information irom th^ ad- 
vanced spirits is, that those who live through this life 
the truest to his neighbour, is the most glorified hereafter 
and with such heaven begins here, and continues right 
along to the hereafter, and that each is punished just in 
proportion to the wrongs he has committed, and no 



43 

long life of evil doing and crime, can be ruled out by a 
single death bed repentance, but he will have to realize 
for each act, its due punishment, not in any physical helb 
but a hell of remorse, the intensity of which will be in 
proportion to the intensity of the crime committed. And 
some of the prominent ways of working out their salva- 
tion, are by assisting, and teaching those below them the 
way for coming up higher, and by seeking out mediums 
and through them relieving the suffering and affiicted that 
are yet in the flesh, and there are none so low but in time 
they will work their way up, and the testimony is that 
this has been the rule from the beginning of man, and will 
continue so as long as man exists. How does this compare 
with the hell your God made? and how does this spirit- 
ualist devil compare with the devil your God appointed 
to rule over your God's hell? Your attempt to shake off 
the responsibility from God, by stating that God made 
hell not for man, but for the devil and his angels, and left 
it to man to make his choice, &c., when you well know that 
according to the Bible, God made man and spread 
him over the earth for some four thousand years without 
preparing for him a possibility for a chance other than 
going to this same hell that he did not make for him! It 
appears to me this attempt at shaking off the responsibil- 
ity of God in this matter, is too thin for any full grown 
man to make. 

Do you suppose a God that has so perfectly arranged his 
plan§ that even a sparrow cannot fall, without his especial 
cognizance, could not fully realize what course four thous- 
and years of generations must unavoidably take? and this 
you call the works of the Creator! Mine the works of the 
creature ! 

In the course of your letter you have cut out verses 
from the Bible>, and pasted them on the letter you sent 
me, I suppor - t o as to impress me more understandingly 



44 

of their significance, and the one you seem to lay the most 
stress upon is the one where you wish to impress mB with 
the great love of God, by sending his only begotton son, 
etc. And you ask me to ponder upon it. Well, I have. 
And the first question that naturally arises is, why did 
God put it off so long before he sent his only begotten son 
to save the race ? Why did he wait until unnumbered 
millions of his children had passed into eternal perdition^ 
beyond a possibility of redemption, before he ever gave 
them a possible chance for escape ? And why did he make 
this place of eternal perdition, this hell, at all, if he had 
such a great love as you try to make him out to possess 
for his children 1 And then to cap the whole, why did he 
appoint the devil, whose fierce vindictiveness knows no 
bounds, to rule over them, and why was he to be so 
eternally afflicted, because he did not believe in God's only 
begotten son, which only begotten son was not given for a 
portion, at least under some three or four thousand years 
after they had been doomed to an eternal hell ? And this 
state of things you wish me to ponder upon, as an exhibi- 
tion of God's great love ! 

Here, I think, is a good place to bring in your twelve 
year oM son. And if he could not get up a doctrine more 
sensible, more just, and more merciful than that, 1 think 
that his mind might be said to be in such a hopeless con- 
dition, that no medicine in the shape of education, would 
be powerful enough to save him. 

A word about the communications from my late wife, 
and your statement about the character of the medium* 
You say, " Now, when you tell me that you receive fresh 
communications from your departed wife, but that they 
were first delivered to a man in whom you nor the com- 
munity have confidence, as to the purity and integrity 
of his moral character,"' etc. As to the opinion of the 
community, that is not for me to say. But when you say 



45 



I have not confidenee in the purity and integrity of his 
moral character, you are as wide of tbe mark as you could 
put it. He was my nearest neighbor the most of the three 
or four years that he was with us, and I do not think 
there was one in the neighborhood who was on more in- 
timate terms, and had more dealings with him, than I had, 
and in all this experience, I never had the first cause to 
doubt his integrity, or the purity of his moral character. 
And it appears to me, when you undertake to assume an 
opinion of mine, of the above character, you have under- 
taken that that does not become you.* 

Now, in respect to my late wife^s communications to me. 
It is very plain that you are not acquainted with the laws 
that control communication, or else you suppose I am a 
medium, which I do not know that I am to any practical 
extent, and the rule is, a spirit cannot communicate directly 
to a person who is not a medium. To do so, they have to 
take possession of one who is, and either speak or write 
to the one they wish to communicate with. And to en- 
lighten you why she would be likely to communicate 
through our friend, I will give some of our past experience. 
As soon as we found out, after our friend came into the 
neighborhood, that he was a medium for spirits to commu- 
nicate through, we directly commenced having circles, re- 
gularly twice a week, alternating mainly between his and 
our houses, and contmued them, I should think, some two 
or three years, and I think there was no recreation that 
Mrs. Angell enjoyed more in the whole course of her life, 
than the attending these circles. And after they had 

* It affords me pleasure to say, that as soon as Mr. learned 

the true state of this case, he apparently improved the earliest op- 
portunity to verbally apologize, freely and fully, without (if I may 
judge his feelings by my own,) leaving even a ripple of feeling 
between us personally, either for this, or for any other point in 
our controversy, for whatever has been said, has been said in re- 
ference to our respective religious positions, not with reference to 
each other in the least. 



46 

moved away, she used to often, often, say, how she missed 
the privilege of attending those circles, and how she would 
like to be, as it were, dropped down in their midst, or they 
in ours, all unexpected, as an agreeable surprise. And, 
under the circumstances, there is nothing more probable 
or reasonable, than, if she could, that she should go there, 
and take possession of him, and write to me. And in these 
communications she states in substance, that we must not 
let our feelings follow her old body, which had fulfilled 
its destiny, and was cast off, but transfer them to her 
spirit, which still, if possible, is more alive than ever, 
with scarcely a perceptible difference in the realization of 
her likes and dislikes, and that she felt the same earnest 
interest in her children and myself, and even in her pets, 
such as plants, flowers, etc., etc., that she used to while 
with us in the body, and she begs of us not to mourn, 
and feel so unpleasantly about her change, for in her 
sympathy for us, it affected her happiness in proportion 
to the intensity of our aflBiction. Which, in fact, seems 
to her to be her only drawback to her perfect enjoyment 
of her present existence. And is not this a glorious 
privilege, to live in times when we all, who have an 
appreciative intellect, can, if we will, avail ourselves of 
the evidence that is, as it were, all about us, within 
easy reach, if we can only be prevailed upon to tear 
away the terrible incrustation of bigotry and deep pre- 
judice that so completely encircles, and darkens so many 
of us, and if we will open our eyes, the evidence wiU 
shine in, of such a conclusive nature, that conviction 
unavoidably follows. And what is the nature of this 
conviction? It is that our near and dear friends, whose 
spirits have left the body, still take as lively an interest 
in us and our affairs, as formerly, and instead of believ- 
ing, as many do, that at best, but a few are taken up, 
perhaps, some vast distance, to be placed in glory, at the 



47 

right hand of God, and the great mass to sink down, 
down, into a bottomless pit of interminable woe, and 
amongst those, perhaps, are many of our nearest and 
dearest connections and friends. I say, that instead of 
having to forego this terrible experience of death, that 
in reality it is yery much like going to sleep, and in a 
short time waking upon the other side, free from the 
pains and afflictions of the old body, with every thing 
at first appearing so natural, that they scarcely realize 
that they are in their new condition, were it not for the 
fact, that they are constantly being greeted by friends 
that they know had passed from their bodies, perhaps, 
long before them ; and these friends they find in a 
greater or less advanced condition, according to their 
real character while in the body, or the progress they 
had made since passing over. It was to illustrate the 
quiet and natural way in which the spirit leaves the 
body, at the time of what we usually call death, that I 
sent you Judge Peckham's account of what purported to 
be his experience, to which account my attention was 
first called by my neighbor, who first saw it in one of 
the secular papers, and spoke of the style and character 
of his description of his experience in the highest 
terms, and when I came to read the communication it 
impressed me as coming from an unusually strong mind, 
well stored with language to express his experience in a 
very plain and comprehensive manner, and you may 
readily imagine that when I received your opinion upon 
it, I was somewhat astonished, and think I, can it be, that 
my neighbor and myself both were so much mistaken, 
and upon my first opportunity I re-read the piece more 
carefully, and got others to read it, upon whose judg- 
ment I felt that I could rely, and my conclusion was, that 
even the rays of my friend's judgment was liable to 
be somewhat diverged from their true course, where 



48 

they shine through his prejudices ; and although I did 
not seem to enlighten him in the direction I intended, it 
certainly gave me some light in another direction, for 
upon this basis I might imagine the possibilities of the 
real merits of that stuff the medium woman called poe- 
try, over which she choked at such a rate to get time. 
And some other hints, towards never having discovered 
any merits or good from Spiritualism. And also about 
the reliableness of his opinion of the excessive gulibility 
of all these millions of belivers in Spiritualism, many of 
which are certainly considered very sound in every other 
direction, and is it possible that they should become all 
at once so susceptible of gullibility in this ? I should 
much sooner believe that the judgment was made up 
through his prejudices, (with my above light) than that 
all this should be the real condition of things. When you 
come to the part of Judge Peckham's communication, 
where he wishes to relieve tlie friends of those that were 
lost, from the f eehng that their souls were not in the cav- 
ern of the mighty deep. This seemed to put the last 
finishing touch to your opinion of the fallacy of the 
whole communication, as coming from Judge Peck- 
ham. Now I presume there is not one in a thousand, 
when they have a friend, or connection drowned, but 
feel a sort of horror at having his or her body remain 
and perish in the water, so much so, that they will 
search for it as long as there is a hope for its recovery. I 
presume the Judge had no intention of conveying a doc- 
trinal idea, but to try to change this common feeling 
that so naturally follows the supposed condition of these 
bodies, to the real condition of their souls, which he 
saw they were fully appreciating their new conditions 
similar to himself, under which circumstances whatever 
condition the old body may be in, its condition is not of 
the least consequence. 



4:9 

After I had finished mainly the foregoing notes, 
J received from you the two lectures, one from 
the Rev. Mr. G. P. Thompson, D. D., the other from 
Rev. G. 0. Baldwin, D. D. And they came in 
very timely. Aside from v/hat you have written me upon 
the subject, and our short conversation on board the 
steamer ** Sea Bird" the other day, I have not had 
scarcely any opportunity to learn what can be said from 
prominent Orthodox quarters, against Spiritualism, 
which seems to me so worthy of our highest thought 
and most earnest investigation. For you are the only 
theological minister I ever exchanged thought with upon 
the subject. So that I am almost entirely inexperienc- 
ed in the way of controversy in this line, and conse- 
quently very illy prepared to do the subject justice. But 
still, if I have by investigation, had awakened in 
me a thought that I feel well assured it would be 
a benefit to my fellow man to know it, I have not the 
least desire to hide it under a bnshel, but otherwise, feel 
it a religious duty to express it, so that my brother raay 
be realizing the benefits of it as well as myself. And I 
feel very grateful to you for expressing to me your convic- 
tions so freely and fully, and for sending me these two 
lectures, so thnt I can avail myself of the thoughts of oth- 
er strong minds upon the subject, and by looking their lec- 
tures over, I can readily perceive that they are men of no or- 
dinary intellects, and are fuU of resources, and are much 
better posted upon Spiritualism than I suppose the clergy 
generally are. Well, I have read their lectures over pretty 
carefully, and Mr. Thompson goes on describing Spiritual- 
ism in various forms, for nearly three columns of the Exam- 
iner without making apparently what he considers him- 
self very damaging criticisms, until he comes to describe 
the unreliableness of the communications, and upon this 
point he says the whole system breaks down. Suppose 



50 

they are not reliable in some respects, to that degree that we 
could wish, It is the on^y opportunity that we have any 
control over that we have ever had presented to us for get- 
ting information about our future state, and is not the 
subject of intense importance, and does it not become us to 
make the most of such as it is, especially as every year's 
experience makes marked improvements in the rehability 
of these communications Almost every gieat movement 
ahead has been gainpd step by step, Steam Power, Magnet- 
ic Telegraphy, Photography, Phrenolog}^ Astronomy, Ge- 
ology, Chemistry, Natural Philosoph}^, all of what we know 
about them were come at, in the main, by degrees, and there 
are none of them, even yet, that are probably perfect, and 
the most of them we are, as it were, only nibbling at the 
edges of them, in comparison with what there is yet to 
learn, and there is no one of them, or all of them together, 
that compares in importance to us to the investigation of a 
subject that offers to us a living hope that we may eventu- 
ally, if not already gain reliable and positive information 
about our eternal future, and shal 1 those of us who have 
investigated this subject until we are satisfied of its truth, 
and this truth bringing to us a fulness of joy unspeakable; 
shall we try to dash this truth all to the ground because it 
happens to tread upon some theological toes 1 

When Mr. Thomson says there is nothing reliable that is 
presented to us, he is certainly mistaken. Some m^edrums 
retain their consciousness while the spirits are communi- 
cating through them, and they can judge much of the char- 
acter of a strange spirit by the sensation his presence pro- 
duces, by which he can form quite an intelligent basis for 
judging of his character. Then there are spirits who have 
a natural affinity for a particular medium, and they become 
acquainted, and, as it were, attached to each other, and the 
medium can tell at once when they take control of them, 
and this acquaintance, perhaps, has continued for years, 
and they never have been deceived hy them, and this confi- 



I 



51 

dence is established the same as we in the main establish 
confidence in each other in this life. Then there are many 
mediums that spirits take control of altogether, and the 
mediums have no knowledge of what they say or do wdiile 
under this control, and if the medium and the character 
of their mediumship is of sufficient importance, this 
mediumship is generally taken control of by a band of ad- 
vanced spirits, who see to it that no spirits communicate 
through them, excepting they communicate, the truth. 
This is especially the case with Mrs. J. F, Conant, the 
medium that the spirits communicate through at the Free 
Circle Rooms in the Banner of Light Building, No. 9 Mont- 
gomery place, Boston. (You may have noticed a descrip- 
tion of them in in the Banner I sent you.) The main object, 
apparently, of these communications are for tests, and also 
to inform the friends of the departed their condition in 
their spirit life, &c., and to make the tests more perfect they 
always tell their names and their age, when they died, and 
how long they had been dead, and what w^as their business, 
and perhaps their religion, giving these general particulars, 
so that there shall be no mistake about their friends recog- 
nition of them, and these communications are published in 
the Banner weekly, ranging from six to eight per week, and 
then a Banner is sent free containing these communications 
to each of the friends of the spirits who communicate, and 
this has been their regular practice for some twelve or 
fifteen years, and this has been in the midst of people of 
the fiercest prejudices against spiritualism, who would 
glory in the opportunity of detecting a single flaw, so they 
could trumpet it before the world. But although this has 
been in practice for so long a time, and all open, plain, 
and so fair, I never have heard of the detection of a single 
mistake. Does this look like an utter failure of the reli- 
ability of these communications? But these communica- 
tions are only one of the many phases of proof upon which 
spiritualism relies for the evidence of its truth, and under 
these circumstances does he state the case fairly when he 



52 

says ^' Spiritualists may say what they will, their whole 
scheme breaks down at this point." 

When he says his ancient miracles, such as healing the 
sick, restoring soundness to the cripple, etc, were wrought 
openly, not in private sceances, of predetermined believers, 
and in darkened chambers. Here again he misstates our 
healing mediums, w^ho perform many as wonderful cures 
as those of old, and they are not performed as a rule in any 
circle at all, but are done hy individuals in open daylight. 
I saw an account some time since by an individual in Pro- 
ridence where I used to live, who I know by reputation, 
of a lady who was so afflicted that she had not been able 
to walk for years, and all the surrounding medical talent 
had been tried without giving any relief. Finally, she 
heard of Dr. J. R. Newton, the healing medium, and she 
decided to try him for her case. He came, and after making 
a few passes over her, he told her to arise and walk, and 
she straightway arose and did walk down a pair of stairs 
and out into the street, and traveled a mile and back, and 
up the stairs again, and from that time set herself about her 
household duties, and continued so up to the time of his 
writing some three or four weeks after she was cured. 
Is this "on a level with jugglery V Is this in "darkened 
chambers/' which Thomson so derisively calls our atten- 
tion to ? No doubt the people in the neighborhood, '^mar- 
veled at the mighty cure," and no doubt also the orthodox 
neighbors said, like the Pharisees of old, "Not venturing 
to deny the facts of the cure,'' "He casteth out devils 
through Belezebub, the prince of devils.'^ Perhaps, not 
using precisely these terms, for the more modern phrase is, 
"it is all the woiks of the devil." What fallacy for Thom- 
son to advance the idea that it was a proof that the old 
form of heeling was miracles, because everybody in their 
ignorance at that time believed they were miracles. When 
since which our knowledge of the natural laws has taken 
such strides in advance, that when the very same things 



53 

are performed, we see at once verj clearly they are per- 
formed through natural laws. Even if the spirits aid us, 
their aid is by the same laws. And would it be soand in 
us to say that these same things being performed two 
thousand years ago were contraventions of nature's laws, 
because everybody then believed they were such, when we 
see plainly that it was through their ignorance of these 
laws that they believed it. And because we have arrived 
at these conch^sions Mr. Thomson says we want to get rid 
of God. Is it possible that we want to get rid of God be- 
cause we find him capable of establishing laws that never 
change, that endure throughout eternity, and that He never 
has to contravene them for some supposed unforseen 
specialty. He might as well say that we would v/ant to 
get rid of God because of old, in their ignorance, the race 
supposed that these stars that appear over our heads 
were placed there for mere ornaments or for astrology rs to 
get up devinations from, (and does it make astrology true 
at that day because everybody then believed it true ;) and 
because we have discovered that these once supposed orna- 
ments are worlds and suns poised in limitless space, per- 
haps millions deep, all moving with such undeviating 
ordtrthatif one should vary in the least from its true 
course it would involve chaos throughout the whole. I say 
would it be an evidence that we want to get rid of God 
because of this discovery. And would we be likely to 
have less reverence for God from discovering that he was 
capable of controlling this limitless universe of heavenly 
bodies with such apparent ease and precision 1 

Mr. Thomson says, towards the close of his remarks? 
speaking of what people say. You do say there certainly is 
a reality in it that spirits do speak ; so much the worse. 
The reason is all the stronger for having nothing to do 
with it. 

*' Hear God in his word, who cannot lie to you, and have 
nothing to do with the lying spirits of men." 



54 

" I implore spiritualists, and especially such as may be en- 
clinmg to spiritualism, to ponder what I have said, and to 
give heed in this relation to the apostolic injunction in my 
text, let them prove this new religion if it can bo called a 
religion, which it confessedly does not come from God. 
Let them subject it dispassionately and fairly to the test 
of sober and sound reason, and hold fast to it if it is good, 
or otherwise reject it, and put it away.-'' What a strange 
medley. He first tells us to have nothing to do with it, 
and then it would seem his text brings him round some- 
what to his senses, and he says: *'let them prove this new 
religion if it can be called a religion. Let them subject it 
dispassionately and fairly to the test of sober and sound 
reason, and hold fast to it if it is good." ''Prove all things, 
hold fast that which is good." Now the sentiment of this 
apostolic text is one of the foremost above all others, the 
spiritualist I presume, are praying for skeptics to dis- 
passionately, and fairly put in practice. But when Mr. 
Thomson pronounces (as he does in his lecture,) spiritualism 
to be one of the ''baldest impositions that ever cheate 1 and 
cursed the world '^ and that,, God characterizes it an abomi- 
nation'' and a work of the devil," and then, c -mands us to 
'have nothing to do with the lying spirits of men, does that 
look like preparing his hearers to look at the subject dis- 
passionately, and fairly with their sober reason or to prove 
all things, &c. ? 

But if I spend all my time on Mr. Thomson, I shall have 
no space left for your friend Baldwin. Well I see he takes 
up nearly four columns of the Examiner, in mainly trying 
to make it appear that the Witch of Endor could read the 
mind of Saul Clairvoyantly, therefore knew what to say 
to him. But what does this all amount to, especially after 
he admits himself that there is communicating matter 
which is not in the mind of the consul ter, and he stated 
that the progress of the scientific research during the last 



55 

twenty years has demonstrated that all the phenomenn, on 
whch spiritualism bases its claims, are to be traced to 
mundane sources. And he says, with this agree Carpenter, 
Farriday, Crooks & Huggins. If I mistake not all of these 
men were appointed on a committee with many others 
some three or four years ago, to give spiritualism a thorough 
scientific investigation. But they aU soon found out that 
spiritualism presented phenomena that none of their known 
science could reach, and they nearly all backed down saying 
in the main, they had more important business to attend to- 

Excepting Prof. Varley, the great electrician, Wallace, 
and Mr. Crooks. They were honest, and independent 
enough to persevere with the investigation, and have de- 
voted more or less of their time to it ever since, especially 
the latter, who has made the investigation of the subject a 
specialty. I have before me at this very moment the 
Apri' number of the Herald of Healthy containing a commu- 
nication from Mr. Crooks taking up some sixteen double 
column pages upon this very subject, giving light touches 
along of his three or four years investigating in this line. 
He makes no conclusion of his investigations but reserves 
that I presume for a volume which he is preparing for the 
public upon the subject. He says this much, ''That he has 
witnessed phenomena that directly oppose the most firmly 
rooted articles of scientific belief." When this volume 
comes out the public will have phenomena presented to them 
of the most startling character. That is if the various ac- 
counts we get from time to time of his experience is a 
criterion. Does this look like the scientific minds having 
traced it all to mundane sources. When Mr. Baldwin says 

"As the case now stands every class of the phenomena put 
forward by Spiritualists can be, and has been produced by 
scientific experiment." Does ha not very much over- do him- 
self when he makes such a statement as that. That strikes 
at the very root of the whole matter. It appears tome 



56 

that if such a result was once eatablished, that it would 
be blazoned forth with such energy, th t scarcely twenty 
four hours wou'd have passed over our heads, before the 
world within the sweep of the telegraph wires would have 
been made acquainted with it, and is it possible th^t so im- 
portant a point should be born so silent that Mr. Baldwin 
only should have found it out, and that too over two years 
ago and the knowledge of it not having extended even yet 
any further? 

It certainly looks very much as if your friend was meas 
uring his statements by as much as he was capable of 
saying, not by the facts of the case, and if we find he does 
so where we are acquainted with the facts, is it not safe 
to conclude he may do so where we are not acquainted 
with the circumstances ; I believe that is sound logic. 

There is another point about the reputed number of 
Spiritualists in this country. Is it probable that a stranger 
from England, should know more about the number of 
Spiritualists, than those who have always lived in their 
midst; and he says Mr. Tedd's account has a mighty fall- 
ing off from those of heated partisans. If report is true, 
the Catholic's account is over ten millions greater than Mr. 
Tedd's ; and can that be called from heated partisans ? 

I see he harps a great deal upon the idea that Spiritual- 
ists think their Spiritualistic ideas are new. I think that 
Spiritualists, as a rule, believe that the idea existed in its 
crude state, at the beginning of the race. But since 
its later devolopement, it has been brought into a more 
practical and reliable form, and the laws that govern it are 
much better understood. To illustrate : who would have 
thought but a few years ago, that the magnetic element 
which mainly was known for its capacity for wrenching 
the mighty oaks as §o many withs, and cleaving asunder 
powerfu^ edifices like air castles, making the very earth 
tremble, aad the people stand aghast before its terrible 



57 

power, would so soon, by the discovery and invention of man 
be guided so harmlessly to the earth, and then so gently and 
efiBciently, almost anihilate space in the transmission of mes- 
sages throughout the world 5 and are there any who believe, 
because we have learned to guide this magnetic element 
into this new and wonderful course, that we have discover- 
ed a new material ; that it is not the same that it was at 
the birth of the globe ? 

And who would have thought but a few years ago, that 
those of us, because possessed of a mediumistic quality in 
our nature, were so terribly persecuted, not only by being 
called witches, wizards, being in league with the devil ; but 
even were decided by Church and S^ate, as being worthy 
of execution, and were executed by scores of thousands in 
the various terrible forms of hanging, drowning, burning, 
pressed to death by heavy weights, drawn into quarters, 
&c., would so soon be quietly opening the doors between 
this and the other, our future life, making it free and with- 
in easy reach of all who have a mind to open their eyes and 
look in, and begin to take incipient steps of knowledge to- 
wards their eternal future ! and does any intelligent Spirit- 
ualist believe, that because of the discovery of this new 
feature, (which is one of the greatest bless ngs that God 
has vouchsafed to man,) that it differs in its nature from 
that of the earliest evidences of it ^t the beginning of the 
race 1 Here again Mr Baldwin misstates us. And towards 
the close he goes on with a stream of exaggerations, which 
are only limited apparently by his not being equal to say- 
ing more ; and this too, without apparently any regard to 
their real merits. But it becomes us to make due allow- 
ance for his straightened position. 

There is nothing, perhaps, that is a greater strain or tria 
upon a man's conscience, than to undertake to stand up for 
a long cherished faiHng cause, against an array of facts, so 
positive and conclusive, and so easy of investigation, and 



58 

when investigated, to find it the embodyment of justice, 
mercy, and sound common sense ; I say, when a man gets 
up and advocates a cause, a portion of which is wanting in 
all of these points, against one that possesses them all, he 
must, unavoidably as it were, stifle his conscience, and 
resort to anathemas, inveetives and over wrought exag- 
geration«!, or he wouU have nothing to say. For Spiritu- 
alism as it were, has absorbed all the facts upon the 
subject. 

"With all the communications that I have read in the 
Banner of Light ^ and all of those through my friend, and 
as unreliable and lying as Mr. Thomson would like to 
make out that the spirits are, I have never yet heard of 
one who had the hardihood to state that he had discovered 
or heard of an eternal hell in the future state of existence. 
And here is where the shoe pinches with the church. I 
presume there is very rarely a church of many members 
but what contain more or less mediums through which 
their departed friends would like to communicate. But the 
moment they do so they are crushed, for they straightway 
begin to tell truths about the future state, that would 
directly upset the whole eternal punishment scheme, and if 
this is taken out the whole thing would soon fall to the 
ground. You might as well expect a stream to continue 
to flow if you was to cut off the showers and springs, or 
that intemperance would continue to flourish if you was to 
permanently cut off all forms of manufacturing alcoholic 
poisons. Take away the privilege of holding the fear of 
an eternal hell over the heads of youths and children, and 
the new members of the orthodox faith ^^ould straightway 
dwindle down to a very small point. Doubtless there are 
many who would rejoice in the privilege of having this 
quality dropped out of their creed if they oould do so with 
hope of sustaining their position. What a melancholy 
position for a liberal, Kigh-toned, progress ve, philanthro- 



59 

pic mind, to be so chained down to a form so repulsive 
to his progressive nature, even for this life. And then 
what a store of regret, disappointment, humiliation, 
and remorse there is being piled up for him for the 
future. And that you may be prevailed upon to escape 
from this experience, is the ever earnest prayer of your 
sincere friend, 

J. B. Angell. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS^ 

020 196 549 4 



